The present invention relates to a method and to a device for wrapping a product in a wrapper made of sheet material according to the preambles to claims 1 and 16. The invention also relates to the corresponding wrapped product, according to the preamble to claim 31.
A method, a device and a product of this type are known, for example, from EP-A-0 591 742. A somewhat similar solution is known from EP-A-0 790 184.
Basically, the solutions described in these documents are intended to produce a wrapper made of sheet material which surrounds the product quite closely (the product is typically constituted by a food product such as a confectionery product, for example, a praline or a chocolate).
The product wrapped in the wrapper is usually intended to be inserted in a small case with a pleated peripheral wall (commonly known as a xe2x80x9cpetit four casexe2x80x9d) in order to render its presentation more pleasing and attractive; in this connection reference may be made to FIG. 7 of EP-A-0 591 742.
It appears, however, that this solution, which has been implemented with great success for some years (and also more conventional wrappers such as those described in EP-A-0 082 952) could be improved from various points of view.
In the first place, the use of the small case requires two additional sets of operations to be performed during the packaging of the product, that is: those inherent in the production of the case and those inherent in the insertion of the product in the case. To ensure and to maintain the precise positioning of the product wrapped in the wrapper relative to the case, it is often necessary to provide locating means such as, for example, a drop of adhesive material which connects the bottom portion of the wrapper of the product to the upper face of the base wall of the case. This results in a need to perform at least one further additional operation during the packaging stage.
When the product is consumed, after it has been removed from the case and the wrapper has been opened/torn, the case constitutes purely and simply an item of refuse to be thrown away in addition to the wrapper. Whereas the latter is usually made of sheet material, typically aluminium foil, which can easily be rolled into a ball and reduced to a minimal size, owing to the pleated structure of its peripheral wall, the case has a certain firmness which hampers its disposal to a certain extent.
The object of the present invention is to provide a solution which enables the above-mentioned improvements to be achieved easily and economically.
According to the present invention, this object is achieved by means of a method, a device and a wrapped product having the characteristics recited in the following claims.